BBC Symphony Orchestra & Chorus 2017-18 Season Sir Andrew Davis conducts Finzi & Shostakovich - BBC Symphony Orchestra

2 Feb 2018, Barbican, London

19:30 Fri 2 Feb 2018 Next Event

Sir Andrew Davis conducts Finzi & Shostakovich

19:30 Fri 2 Feb 2018 Barbican, London

Two works full of hope from the 1950s: Finzi, writing under the shadow of death; and Shostakovich perhaps responding to the death of Stalin.

Performances & Interviews

02:11

Conductor Sir Andrew Davis and cellist Paul Watkins introduce Finzi's Cello Concerto

Ahead of the performance on 2 February 2018 at the Barbican Centre

Feb '18BBC

Programme

- - Gerald Finzi
  - Cello Concerto in A minor
- - Dmitry Shostakovich
  - Symphony No. 10 in E minor

Performers

Andrew Davis
conductor
conductor
Paul Watkins
cello
cello
BBC Symphony Orchestra

Composers

Concert Information

Two very different works composed within two years of each other. Gerald Finzi’s glorious Cello Concerto, written in 1955 at the request of John Barbirolli, bursts with melody. It was premiered the night before Finzi’s death and was written with death a constant presence, yet it has a powerful sense of defiance about it. Paul Watkins is the soloist.

Shostakovich’s Tenth Symphony (1953) is one of the composer’s best-loved works, powerful, dramatic and full of hints as to what it might portray (Stalin had died earlier that year). Its intensity never fails to make an impression.

Sir Andrew Davis, who headed the BBC SO from 1989 to 2000 makes a welcome return to the orchestra.